31 August 2010

...and it is making me lose sleep. It's like an obsession. Each moment I spend doing something else seems like a complete waste of time.
I'll wash up and think, have a bath and think - I'm writing this now at after midnight in the UK and I really need to go to bed, having woken up at 6am I need my sleep.
The last few weeks have been great though. My procrastinating ways have been placed firmly in the past. I have a passion and it is to make this seed of an idea grow into something worthwhile.

I did take time out over the weekend to attend a wedding in the country - a lovely wedding, the groom is one of the nicest people I know and his new wife seems equally lovely. The celebration was marred a little by the sexual innuendos and unwelcome hands on my body (read: molestation) by 2 very sad brothers. You know the type: still live at home with elderly parents, no discernible means of income and completely distraught that they have done so little with their lives. Unwashed (reeked) and orange-brown teeth. And because no money, hung around people poncing the next glass of their favourite tipple.
I'm not a violent person but it did cross my mind to give each of these morons a sharp left hook but then I had images of the wedding being spoiled, the police officers (who had seen maybe 4 'people of colour' in their whole lives) dragging this black woman in handcuffs and me locked up thinking how to explain it to the white judge in the morning - with the moron brothers in intensive care on drips.
No, not a good idea.

Yet I felt violated and weak. I failed to deal with the situation. I spent over 5 hours in their company and it was a nightmare. They used their drunkenness as a mask for their inadequacies and I didn't deal with it well. I left the wedding early saying I would be back and retreated to a safe haven.

I raced back to London away from the stale beer, 'eejats' and sheep and threw myself onto my nice clean comfortable bed, ecstatic to be home and then I had a long hot bubble bath and got back to business.

Wow, I never intended to share all that with you! Just to tell you that I'm recovering and focusing on my business.

It is exciting and challenging and I feel great having to wrack my brains again. More people should try it...

09 August 2010

You may or may not be aware of the alleged missionaries killed in Afghanistan recently. Read more HERE.
It brings to the fore a part of the reason for the occupation/crusade in the region by Western forces.
International Assistance Mission has said the doctors shot to death by the Taliban were there for humanitarian reasons, to provide eye care for people who lived in remote, almost inaccessible regions of the country. Yet I am not completely convinced.
What I am convinced about is just how stupid, yes I have to use that word, stupid we are that of all the things in the world we could be doing, experiencing, discovering, enjoying - we kill each other for imaginary entities. It is so crazy to think of people killing each other because one thought Peter Pan was real and another Paddington the Bear! Yet that is what has happened.
The 10 people killed are a tragic illustration that we need to wake up from this mind-fog that has had a strangle-hold on our thinking for thousands of years. It sometimes makes me weary as I see it all around me.

I listened to an audio book the other day, a mp3 of pure excellence from a man who wrote clearly, succinctly and I was enthralled. Within the first couple of minutes I was hooked, paused the recording and switched off everything in the place that could ring, whistle or make any other noise to disturb me. I ran back to repose on my couch, making myself extremely comfortable in the process. Around chapter 3, the 'god stuff' came churning out. I was in shock. I felt as if I had been slapped with a wet rag! This was from a man who had travelled, lectured on critical thinking, started and sold businesses around the world, written award winning books (this was my first encounter) and there he was dropping in 'praise god', 'thank god', 'oh, I prayed so hard'.

It is insiduous. Gets into almost every nook and cranny, distorts thinking, makes people do crazy things and arrests development. It makes some people a lot of money, it relieves a larger majority of a lot of money. It is clever as it extracts money in small dribs and drabs and also in a big chunk. It makes people feel guilty, obsessed about sex, worried about death, worried about life. It makes people participate in meaningless ceremonies which encourage them to spend money: christenings, church weddings, church funerals.
It encourages dangerous practices: penile mutilation on young helpless male babies, exorcisms, female genital mutilations.

It is encourages people to believe absolute rubbish and then kill others because of it and so 10 more dead.